Through A Glass, Darkly
by A Lonely God
Summary: Castiel learns the hard way that being human is painful. He learns from cut hands, from broken shards of glass buried deep in his feet, from the stinging of the bees that at one point he'd grown to love.
1. Chapter 1

Castiel learns the hard way that being human is painful. He learns from cut hands, from broken shards of glass buried deep in his feet, from the stinging of the bees that at one point he'd grown to love. He learns that with humanity comes pangs of hunger, not only for food in the physical form, but for affection and the company of others. And he learns, almost right away, the constant threat of emotional pain. More than once he finds himself walking the sides of the roads in his tattered trench coat, bruised and bloody, biting back tears that he's never felt before.

So when Castiel turns up at the door of the Winchesters' bunker, shivering and drenched in rain and horribly painfully human, Sam and Dean are more than surprised. He is ushered inside with no questions asked, and directed towards the nearest chair. Dean runs off to a spare room to grab Castiel a towel, and Sam, still slightly out of commission, sits next to him, on the couch. Dean returns then, carrying the softest towel he owns, and drapes it over Cas' shoulders.

"Cas, buddy, where've you been?" Dean asks after a few minutes of the three of them sitting in silence.

Castiel holds up his palm in silence, the skin of which has been rubbed raw by the pavement during a rather unceremonious dive off of the road. The blood around it is dead and dry but at the same time mixed with the raindrops rolling down his arms.

"Bleeding." Castiel answers, and his voice is void of all the emotion that he can muster it to be devoid of. His words are cracked, useless on his useless human tongue and he looks down at his dirty, muddy shoes with nothing but guilt in his eyes.

Dean watches him closely, forehead wrinkled from frowning so deeply. The fallen angel kicks off the shoes that Jimmy Novak must certainly have treasured at one point, and reveals socks soaked in his vessel's – _his_ – blood. Dean cringes.

There is a silence in the bunker as Castiel pulls off the socks. It isn't a comfortable silence, nothing near that to be sure. It is the silence of a world crashing down on the shoulders of an innocent soul. It is the sound of the world crashing down around Castiel.

"Jesus, Cas," Dean says when the former angel removes the socks from his feet. The balls of his feet and the heel are cut and bleeding, almost but not quite infected. From where he is standing, Dean can see shards of glass jutting from the wounds, "What the hell happened to you?"

Castiel places one foot on the hardwood of the bunker's library gingerly, leaving a trail of blood behind him. He swallows thickly, then, because it is now, as he looks between the floor and Dean, that he can feel the pain of humanity overwhelming him.

"I panicked," He admits, wringing his hands and then clasping them in his lap gently. His shoulders shake with sobs that come from a place inside him that doesn't even know exists. He feels the tears stinging his eyes, and for the millionth time Castiel curses himself and the god that made these bodies so weak. He holds up his bloodied hand, "I was nearly struck by a vehicle. I cut my foot while I was walking here. You humans are so fragile."

Dean and Sam exchange worried glances, and Sam leans over to clap a hand on Castiel's shoulder. The former angel winces; his back aches from running and walking and sleeping on the ground for lack of a bed to stay in.

"Hey, man. You're safe here, alright? But, uh, we gotta get you to a hospital or something. You're bleeding a lot."

Castiel raises his eyes from the floor, then, and stares Sam down. His hands are shaking, but he isn't quite sure whether or not that's from not eating, or from the fact that he's lost a great deal of blood. Tears are still fresh in his eyes, and he blinks quickly to make them go away.

"I don't want to go to a hospital." Castiel states adamantly, dirty hair matted to his head, and without being able to stop himself, Dean automatically thinks about how childish Castiel is being, "You can fix me. Fix me."

Castiel isn't quite sure what he means when he asks the Winchesters to fix him. He certainly is interested in getting his foot sewn up – the pain is excruciating. But inside his chest – a very important part of the body, he has discovered – he feels the most uncomfortable tightness. He suspects that this is the sadness that he's heard so much about; the same sadness Dean experiences when he thinks about his mother, or the same sadness that chokes Sam up when he hears the name Jessica.

Castiel has learned a lot from the Winchesters about being human – he has learned the beauty of the species, and their sense of right and wrong, and how wonderful and horrible and on fire they can be, all pink and gold and shimmering in the eyes of God. But he has not learned how to live.

And Castiel cries then, because he does not want to be human, and he does not want to be beautiful and horrible and hurt. He's damaged this vessel, he's damaged himself inside, and he believes that he has no chance of recovery.

He doesn't know how he ends up from the chair to the bathtub, but the next time he is aware of the movements around him, Castiel is sitting in water that nearly scalds his skin. The liquid is tinged pink from the blood on his foot, and he looks down at bumps appearing on his precious, pale skin.

"Goosebumps." Dean's voice comes from above him, and Castiel looks up with wide blue eyes. Dean is wiping his hands on a towel to dry them, and Castiel realizes then that his hair is clean and wet, and that Dean has just washed it, "Hey, Cas. We're gonna get you fixed up, okay? You're gonna be fine."

Castiel's voice is but a whisper in the bathroom, bouncing off of the walls of the tub, "It hurts."

There is a pained expression on Dean's face as he says the words, and the elder Winchester reaches down to place a hand on Castiel's wet, bare shoulder, "I know. Sam's gonna stitch the foot up when you ge-"

"Not the foot," Castiel clarifies, looking away from Dean and down into the water of the tub, "Being human."

Castiel learns the pain of humanity the hard way. He learns from the cuts and bruises and stings, from the needles Sam pulls through his foot that night, from the way his muscles ache as he lies down in a bed to get rest for the first time in his life. And he learns that he's not the only one with the deep tightness of sadness in his chest.

Dean is silent, just for a moment, "Yeah. I know."

* * *

**[an] I had intended on making this a mutlichapter story chronicling the days following Cas' return to the bunker, but I'm unsure; any thoughts? [an]**


	2. Chapter 2

Castiel has taken to looking out the window. There aren't many in the bunker, and that's why he sets up a chair beside his favorite one and sits there for hours on end, feeling the warmth of the sun against the skin of his face. Sam often watches him from the large table while he scrolls down pages and pages web searches looking for information on the Knights of Hell, but they rarely speak. They never speak.

It has been three and a half days since Castiel's return to the bunker. He hasn't spoken a work to neither Sam nor Dean since he stumbled in and showed off his wounds, and he's refrained from eating and sleeping as much as he can. Sam says that it's just him getting used to being human, but Dean disagrees. Dean is worried. And because he is all of these things, Dean does absolutely nothing.

Until the fourth day.

On the fourth day that Castiel spends at the bunker, Dean wanders in to find him in his usual seat at the window. Sam is still asleep. The kitchen is empty, and to Dean, it smells like the clean dishes he just washed last night and the warm beer he forgot on the table and the cold coffee he forgot to pour down the drain before bed. It smells like home. Dean stands in the doorway a moment more, arms crossed and frustrated and so terribly confused about how to help the man sitting in his kitchen, looking out the window at the birds.

He doesn't say anything, because he knows Castiel won't answer him anyway. Instead, Dean flicks on the coffee maker, wrestles his bathrobe off his shoulders, and pulls a chair noisily up to Castiel's. He sits down beside him, quietly, and says nothing. They both stare out the window in silence until Castiel clasps his hands in his lap and Dean finally works up the courage to say something.

"What are you doing, Cas?" He asks, knowing full well that Castiel can hear him, but is choosing not to respond, "You've been lookin' out the window for three friggin' days. You gonna eat? Huh? You gonna sleep?"

Castiel wrings his hands in his lap, listening half-heartedly to Dean as he rants. The sunlight is streaming in through the window, catching his eyes at such an angle that he has to squint to see. There are birds outside on the grass. He can see the corner of the Impala glinting as though it were a brand new car, and the dew twinkling on the grass.

The next time he's aware of his surroundings, the room is silent. Castiel blinks, realizing that Dean has been talking to him, and that he's been ignoring him the whole time. He turns his head back to the hunter and stares at him. Dean's face is bathed in emotion, a strange mix between pain and anger and sadness. Castiel says nothing.

"What the hell are you doin', Cas?"

Silence.

"I was thinking I may go jump off the roof."

Dean is entirely unsure of what to say to that, because in the time he's known Castiel, he's only ever heard him say anything of that magnitude once. He's unsure because despite that fact that everyone around him seems to enjoy dying, he's never pegged Cas to be the one to want to kill himself. And hearing those words make his heart shatter into a million tiny pieces.

His heart shatters the same way it did when Sam had said 'so?' when faced with death. It shatters the same way it did when he'd heard the last breaths of air leave Bobby's lungs. And those times, he'd managed to hold it inside of himself, putting the pieces together and gluing the cracks shut. But hearing Castiel – hearing the former heavenly warrior – sit at his kitchen table, looking so small and so sad so very unlike himself, is something that isn't so easy to patch up.

Dean sits beside the former angel quietly, contemplating an answer, looking for the words. He looks down at his feet, then back up to Castiel, who is staring at him, and opens his mouth.

"Cas…"

The man looks at him expectantly, but Dean is still unsure of what to say. He gingerly lifts up a hand and places it on Castiel's wrist, squeezing gently. It isn't much in the way of comfort, but it's the only thing he knows.

Dean's hand on his wrist brings up unwanted memories. Castiel is staring at the hunter's hand, trying to dispel images of the inside of a crypt, of Dean on his knees, broken and bruised and bloody. Images of a righteous soul in a shattered body. He hears the sounds; the breathing, the groaning, the 'I need you, Cas'.

"Cas."

Dean's voice is stronger now, not the quiet whisper it had been the first time. The grip on Castiel's wrist tightens.

"Cas, buddy," Dean says, and Castiel's heart pangs and the familiar use of the endearment, "I dunno what's going on, alright? I dunno what you're going through. But I can promise you, you are not going off that roof. I don't care if you gotta sit by the window the rest of your life. Okay?"

Castiel is unsure of how to respond. He stares out the window and bites his lip. His human vessel, and, he supposes, himself, is strangely moved by Dean's words. With his free hand, Castiel plays with the hem of his shirt.

_Somebody wants you, Castiel._ He thinks to himself, feeling pressure behind his eyelids. He is familiar with crying, now; he is increasingly getting used to the burning in the corners of his eyes, and the fire that tingles up and down his nose in advance of the tears. _Dean wants you to stay._

He wipes at his eyes, and Dean withdraws his hand awkwardly, not knowing how to comfort the former angel.

"I've caused so much pain…" Castiel trails off.

And that's something Dean understands. He understands the guilt. He gently grabs Castiel by the shoulders and pulls him into him. He does not protest, rather, leans his head on Dean's shoulder.

That morning, the two of them stare out the window together.

* * *

**[an] I actually hate this. I might redo it later.[an]**


End file.
